"But suppose she wakes up and asks for Parkins?" queried Villard, anxiously. "I had thought of that, and my hope is that something else will occur. But that very thing might happen. Better be prepared for it," said Updyke, his face denoting his serious thought on that subject. "Please particularize, Henry. What precedent have you to offer?" Villard's interest was from the depths of his heart and the uncertainty of the girl's attitude on awakening was already forming a dread in his mind. "I gauge my thoughts on what has gone before in numerous cases. Consider yourself in my car seated in front beside me. I'm loaded with booze but it is inside of me, so I do not catch the odor of it myself. But you, who have never touched liquor, catch a whiff of it, and instantly your suspicion is aroused to the fact that I'm a drinking man." "But there are----" "Yes, I know there are moderate drinkers, but girls brought up carefully, as Winifred has been, have nevertheless come to know the terrorism of old John Barleycorn. She lives near a great artery of automobile traffic. Most of it perfectly respectable, but some of it vile and besotted. She reads the Riverhead paper probably, and a magazine of some sort, appealing to her feminine viewpoint. In other words, now that she is a business woman, her vision has enlarged, and not a day goes by that she does not witness something that reminds her that she is opposed to drunkards. But she is sorry for them, nevertheless. Given her choice, she surely would not associate with a man who drinks." "Undoubtedly Parkins had been drinking. Dr. Benton admitted as much to me," volunteered Villard. "The odor was still on his breath." "Yes, but Winifred may not have sensed it, for Parkins uses the old fashioned eau de cologne on his lips, eyebrows, handkerchief, and his hair always smells of pomade and tonic. A country girl might easily believe that perfume used by a fascinating fellow like Parkins was quite the thing, but no girl would sit beside a man who drove into a curve at a fifty or sixty mile gait without sensing danger--would she?" "I dare say no sophisticated girl would--probably no girl, sophisticated or otherwise, would fail of being apprehensive," agreed Villard. "Very well--now comes the point you originated. You asked me to guess what she will say when she comes to her senses. She will not say what you think she will. The last thing she thought about just as the cars collided will be the thoughts she will wake up with." "Sounds logical," agreed Villard. "Statistics prove it in hundreds of cases. As her senses left her she felt a shock akin to death," said Updyke, soberly. "And as she went into what looked to be certain death she must have wondered if Parkins was insane. It was all so sudden, her thoughts may not have been entirely formulated, but even in the zone of coma the brain functions in a weird sort of way, incomprehensible to the victim, but remembered afterward--if the victim survives."